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LETTEPt FROM ROBERT DALE OWEK 



Edilorialfrom i/is Fve.ni.vg Post of mvemlerii, 1SG2.) I anrestiicted pen, ia her own hand-under which 
THE POLIflCAL PaOBLEM. she will coneent to rtunior, (x.e?t in me coc 

"We publish elsewhere a discussion of the as- '•'"gencj— conquest, more or lets complete, by 
pects dnd duties of tbe times, by one of our most '°''.^® °^ ^'"™^- 
distinguished statesmen and poliiicians, Robert 5''^ ^^ ^}^'']^ *° ^'^^^^^ P«^=« ^^ coDquest ? 

T. , 7^ TT 1! .u J xr \ ^"^ ^^^f '^■^ o*^ an answer, let US look closelv at a 

Dale 0(vei. ITnliliO some other democrats, Mr. | j^^ at^^i^ji^^^ ^^^^^ ooit cioseiy at a 

0<»ea does not deceive himself as to the nature of By the census of 1860 the numhfr of wh'te 
the civil war in which we are engaged. He takes . males between the ages of 18 and 45 is, in the 
no narrow or partisan view of the motives under ; loyal states, about four millions ; antJ, in the dis- 
which it should be conducted. He desires no end 'oj^il states, about one million tfcree hundred 
of it which shall not be enduring in its results. ! thousand ; a little upwards of three to one. Iha 

Mr. Owen discerns, what many had long since I disproportion seems overwhelmingly great, 
discerned before, and many more are just begin- .E'^V,*^'.^ calculatiot., as a basis of military 



ning to discern, that tbe continued existence of 
two orders of society, so different as those of the 



strength, is wholly fallacious ; for it includes per 

sons of one color only. 
, , . . . , . . ^^^ °f *^^ above f jur millions the North hi3 

free and slave states, is mcorapatible with the to provide soldiers and (with inconsiderable ex- 
peace of the continent. Whether ia the Union or I ceptions, not usually extending to field- labor) 
cut of it, slavery can only prove a cause of per- laborers also. 

petual irritation and conflict, and a suspeusiou ofj But of the three millions atdahalf of slaves 
hostilities or truce of any kind a mere postpone- j o^^ed in the rebel states about two millions may 
ment of a more dreadful outbreak. Emancipation I ^^ estimated as laborers. Alloiv three hundred 
is at once the surest means of suppressing tbe re- 1 ^''°'!'''°'^ f ^^^^^ «« employed in domestic 

, ,,. J •. A (u - • services and other occupations folio wed by women 

hellion a3 an armed resistance, and of harmonizing „^^„„, „ j u ^ , 

, ,. ,. . ° among us, and we have seventeen hundred thou- 

the sections as bodies politic. j ,^^^ plantation hands, male and female, each one 

His statements are clear, his arguments cogent, | of which counts against a northern laborer on 
his motives patriotic, and we ask for his presenta- farm or in work-shop. 

lion of the case the calm, unprejudiced considera- ; Then, of that; portion of population whence 
tion of men of all parties, and particularly of that soldiers and outdoor laborers and mechanics 
democratic party to which the writer has all his '^"^'' '^^''^^5' ^s taken, the northern states have 

tour millions and the southern states three 
millions. 

Supposing the negroes all loyal to their masters, 
it follows that the true proportion of strength 
available in this war— that i?, ot soldiers to fight 
and laborers tosupportthenation whilefighting— 
may fairly enough be taken at three in the South 



life adhered. 



THE COST OP PEACE. 

To the Hon. Salmon P. Chase, Secretary of the 

Trtamry : 

Sir: In briefest terms I state the propositions 
which, as the subject of our recent conversation, j to four in the North. 
I promised to reduce to writing. Under this supposition of a South united, with- 

What are the reasonable hopes of peace? i out regard to color, in an eflfort for recogDition, 

Not, that within the next fifty dajs the South, shall we obtain peace by subduing ber? If hietoiy 
availing herself of the term of grace offered in teach truth, we shall not. Never, since the world 
the President's proclamation, may, to save her \ began, did niae millions of people band together, 
favorite institution, return to her allegiance, resolutely inspired by the one idea of achieving 
Let us not deceive ourselves. There are no con- 1 their independence, yet fail to obtain it It is 
dilions, no guaranties— no, not if we proffer her , not a century since one-third of the number sue- 
a blanS sheet on which to set them down, with j cessfuUy defied Great Britain. 



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Bat let T13 snppoEe the negroes of the Sonth 
loyal to the Union instead of to their masters, 
how stands the matter then ? 

In that ease, it is not to a united people, but to 
a Confederacy divided against itself, that we are 
opposed; the misters on one side; the laborers, 
exceeding them in number, on the other. 

Suppose the services of these laborers trans- 
ferred to us, what will then be the proportion, on 
either side ot Icrces available, directly and in 
directly, for military purposes? 

As about five and three-lourtbs to one and a 
third : in other words, nearly as nine to two. 

Such a wholesale transfer is, of course, impoesi 
ble in practice. But in so far as the transfer is 
possible, and shall occur, W3 approach the above 
results. 

How much wisdom, under these circumstances, 
is there in the advice that we should put down 
the rebellion first and settle the negro question 
aiterwards? What shall we say of their states- 
manship who, in a war like this, would leave out 
of view the practical effects of emancipation ? 

On the other hand, however, it is to be admitted 
that African loyalty in this war will little avail us, 
if we have not good sense and good feeling 
enough properly to govern the negroes who may 
enter our lines. 

To render their aid available, in the first place 
we must treat them humanely ; a duty we have 
yet to learn: and secondly, bath for their sakes 
and for our own, we must not support them in 
idleness. Doubtless, they are most efficient as 
laborers, as domestics in camp, as teamsters, or 
employed on entrenchments and fortifications, or 
in ambulance carp?, or as sappers and miners ; 
or, as fast as southern plantations sh'aU fall into 
our possession, as field-hands. But if all these 
posts become over filled, better do away with the 
necessity for further draft in the North by putting 
muskets in the.hands of able-bodied men, colored 
differently from ourselvee, thaa to delude their 
ignorance into the opinion that among the pri pi 
leges of freedom is food without work. 

Have we philanthropy and discretion enough 
wisely to administer eueh a change of system ? 
Possibly not. Administrative capacity in public 
affairs is not our strong point. We would do well 
-to bear in mind, however, that without such ca- 
pacity not this war only, but cur entire govern- 
mental experiment, will prove a failure at last. 

Do other objections hold against the plan ? 
Dees humanity forbid us to accept the aid of an en- 
slaved race? in so far ashuminity can ever enjoin 
war at all, ehe enjoins the emplojmsnt, by us, of 
the African in this; first, because his employment 
may shorten, by years, the fratricidal struggle ; 
and then, because, if he is not permitted to assist 



in civilized warfare under tib, and if, withont hia 
aid, we fail to effect his liberation and thus disap- 
point his hopes, he may be overtaken , by the 
temptation to seek freedom and revenge in his 
own wild way. In accepting the liberated slave 
as a soldier we may prevent his rising as an 
assassin. By the creation of negro brigades we 
may avert the indiscriminate massacres of servile 
insurrection. 

Or is there an insuperable difficulty of caste in 
the way? In a contest likely to eventuate in se- 
curing to another race than ours the greatest of 
temporal blessings, are we determined to shut 
out that race from all share in its own liberation ? 
Are we so enamored of the Moloch, War, that we 
will suffer none out our sons to pass through the 
Qre ? Terrible penalty to pay, with life and death 
at stake, for a national prejudice against the 
southern Pariah ! 

As to the duty of our rulers in the premises, 
cannot see according to what principle of ethif 
a government, charged with the lives of million 
the patting dowa of a gigantic rebellion and tt 
restoring of tranquillity to the land, has the righ 
in the hour of its utmost need, to scorn a vast eli 
ment of strength placed within its reach and ; 
its clisposal ; nor why, if it refuses to avail itse 
of such an element, it should not be held respoi 
sible for the lives it sacrifices and the hopes . 
blights. 

But we need emancipation far less for the m; 
terlal aid it affords— great, even indispeneabh 
though it be— than because of other paramour 
considerations. 

We have tried the experiment of a federr 
Union, with a free-labor system in one portion ( 
it and a slave- system in another, for eighty yeare 
and no one familiar with our affairs for a quarts 
of a century past is ignorant that the result hs 
j been an increase— embittered year by year in evex 
accelerated ratio— of dissentions, of section; 
jealousies, of national heart-burnings. Wher 
eighteen months since, these culminated in wa: 
it was but the issue which our ablest etatesmei 
looking sorrowfully into the future, had Ion 
since foretold. Bat if, while yet at peace ana 
with all the influence of revolutionary reminip 
cences pleading the cause of Union, this diversity 
of labor systems, producing variance of character 
and alienation of feeling, proved stronger to di- 
vide than all past memories and present interests 
to unite, what chance is there that its baneful 
power for evil should cease, now, when to 
thoughts of fancied injuries in other years are 
added the recollections of the terrible realities 
enacted on a hundred bloody battlefields, from 
which the smoke has scarcely passed away ? 

None— the remotest ! 



A suspension of hostilities we can purchase ; a ' 
few years' respite, probably, in which to return 
to our money-getting, before the storm bursts 
forth anew with gathered force ; but if we look bet 
yond 6elfl3hneBS and the present ; if our children 
are in our thoughts ; if we are suffering and es- 
pending now, that they, in aland of prosperity, 
may live and die in peace, then must we act so that 
the result shall endure. We must not be content 
to put off the evil day. The root of the evil— the 
pregnant cause of the war — that must be eradi- 
cated. 

Report has it that a western i)oiitician recently 
proposed, as the best solution ol our difhculties, 
the recognition of slavery in all the states. Such 
an idea has a basis of truth ; namely, that a state 
of war is, among us, the necessary result of con- 
flicting labor systems. Such an idea might even 
. Je carried out and lead to peace but for that pro- 
jressive spirit of Christian civilization which we 
'are not openly outrage, how imperfectly soever 

^ obey its humane behests. 

There are a thousand reasons— geographical, 

ommercial, political, international— why we 

^^liouldnot consent to a separation into two c?n- 

^deracies ; it is a contingency not to be thought 

a or entertained ; but if we look merely to the 

\ndUions of la&tivg peace, the chance of main- 

";xiDing it would be far better if the independence 

jf the South were to be recognised with her 

legroes emancipated, than it she were to return 

'} her allegiance, retaining her slave system. 

For in the former case, the cause of dissension 
. eing uprooted, thetendency would be to re unite, 

Qd a fe w years might see us a singld nation again ; 
*hile, in the latter, a constantly active source of 
fritation still existing, three years of breathing 
^me would not elapse without bringing endless 
fuarrels and a second rebellion. 
' Conceive re union with slavery still in existence, 
•nagine southern sympathizers in power among 
'3, offering compromises. Suppose the South, 
^ihausted with military reverses and dedring a 
-.w years' armistice to recruit, decides to accept 

under the guise of peace and reconstruction? 

|7hat next? ThousandSkOf slaves, their excited 

bpes Of emancipation crushed, fleeing across 
the border. A Fugitive Slave law, revived by peace, 
demanding their rendition. Popular opinion in 
the North opposed to the law, and refusing the 
demand. Renewed war, the certain consequence 

Or take, even, the alternative of recognition- 
recognition ol an independent confederacy, still 
slave-holding. Are we, then— becoming the sole 
exception among the nations of the earth— to 
make ourselves aiders and abettors of the slave- 
system of a foreign nation, by agreeicg to return 
to her negro refugees seeking liberty and an asy- 



lum among us? National self-respect imper- 
atively forbids this. Public sentiment would 
compel the rejection, as abase humiliation, of any 
proposed treaty stipulation, providiog for rendi- 
tion of runaway slaves. Yet the South would re- 
gard such rejection in no other light than as a 
standing menace — a threat to deprive her ol what 
she regards as her most valuable property. Co- 
terminous as for hundreds— possibly thousands — 
of miles our boundaries would be, must not 
the South, in coa».mon prudence, maintain all 
along that endless border-line an armed elave- 
police? Are we to consent to this? And if we 
do, shall we escape border raids alter fleeing fugi- 
tives? No sane man will expeciit. Are we to 
suffer these? Wc are disgraced. Are we to resent 
them ? It is a renewal of hostilities. 

State elections may go as they will. Their re- 
sults can never change the fact that auy patty ob- 
taining the control of the government and adopt- 
ing the policy that the settlement of the emanci- 
pation question is to be postponed till the war 
shall be closed, will never, wriile it pursues that 
policy, see this war permanently closed — noteven 
by accepting a shameful disruption of our country. 

Bat if emancipation is to avail us as a peace meas- 
ure, we must adopt it boldly, resolutely, effec 
tually. It must be genera!, not partial; extend- 
ing not to the slaves of rebels only, but to every 
slave on this continent. Even if it were practi- 
cable, which it is not, with slavery non-existent 
in the northern states and abalished in those 
which persist in rebellion, to maintain it in the 
narrow border-strip, it is precisely there, where 
negro fugitives can the most readily escape, 
that its maintenance would the most certainly 
lead to war. 

Can this great peace measure be constitutionally 
enacted ? 

A proclamation or (the more appropriate form) 
an act of General Emancipation, should, in its 
preamble, set forth, in substance, that the claims 
to service or labor of which it deprives certain 
persons having been proved, by recent events, to 
be of a character endangertng the supremacy of 
the law, jeopardizing the integrity of the Union, 
and incompatible with the permanent peace of 
the country, are taken by the government, with 
just compensation made. Under circumstances 
far less urgent than these, the law or custom of 
civilized nations, based on considerations of pub- 
lic utility, authorizes such taking of private pro- 
perty for public use. We ourselves are familiar 
with its operation. When a conflagraiion in a 
city threatens to spread far, houses in the line. of 
Its progress may legally be seized and destroyed 
by the authorities in order to arrest it ; and the 
owners are not held to have been wronged if they 



are paid for such losses under an equitable ap- 
praisement. But it is not the existence of part of 
a city that is now endangered ; it is the integrity 
of one among the first Powers of the world that 
is menaced with destruction. 

The truth ot the preamble suggested has be- 
come, in my judgment, incontrovertible. It will 
receive the assent of an overwhelming majority 
of *the people of the loyal etates. The public sen- 
timent of Europe will admit its truth. 

Let us confess that such a preamble, as preface 
to act or proclamation, could not have command- 
ed the assent of more than a small fraelion of our 
people, only two short years ago — two years, as 
we reckon time ; a generation, if we calculate by 
the stirring events and far-reaching upheavals 
that have been crowded into the eventiul months. 
In such days as these abuses ripen rapidly. Their 
consequences mature. Their ultimate tendencies 
become apparent. We ere reminded of their 
transitory character. We are reminded that al 
though for the time, and in a certain stage of hu 
man progress, some abuses may have their tem- 
poral y use, and for this, under God's economy, 
may have been suffered to continue ; yet all 
abuses have but a limited life. The Eight only is 
eternal. 

The rebellion, teacher end creator as well as 
scourge and destroyer, by sternly laying bare the 
imminent dingers of slavery, has created the con- 
Btitutionality of emanc'pition. It has done more. 
It has mide emancipatioa a bounden political 
duty, as well as a sirictiy constitutional right. 

Can we, in dtclaring emancipation, legally avoid 
the payment, say of two hundred millions, in the 
shape of compensation to loyal slaveholders? 

Not it a elaveholdtr 6 right to service and labof 
from his slaves, when not forfeited by treason, it 
legal. On humanitiirian grounds the legality ot 
that right, tas been denied. But a construction of 
the coDttituilon adverse to such denial, and ac 
quiesced in Vy the naiion throughout more than 
two generatioES, is held by most men to be reason 
snfficieit why the right in question should be re 
garded as private property. If it be private pro 
perty, ihtr, excfp'; by violating the fifth article 
of the amendments to the constitution, it cannot 
be taken for public use without just compensa 
tion. To violate any article of the constitution is 
a revolutioBaiy act; bu^- siich acts cost a ration 
more than a ftw hundred millions of dollars. 

The risk that a future decision of the Supreme 
Court might declsre emancipation without com- 
pent ation to be unconstitutional is, of i' self, suffi 
clent justification of the President's policy, 
corresponding to the above saggestions, in this 
matter. 



Such compenjation will be unpopular with 
many. Wise and just acts, when they involve sac- 
riflces, frequently are. A wrong long tolerated 
commonly entails a., penalty, which is seldom 
cheerfully paid. Yet, even on other grounds, we 
ought not, in this case, to begiuige the money. 
Who deserve better of their country than those 
brave men who, in the border and other slave 
states, have clung to their loyalty through all the 
dark hours of peril even to life ? 

Precautions naturally suggest themselves 
against false pretences of loyalty. Itsjems ex- 
pedient that he who fhall have proved that he is 
the legal owner of certiin slaves, and also that 
he has ever been loyal to the Union, should re- 
ceive a certificate of indebtedness by the govern- 
ment, not tratisferable, to be paid at some fixed 
time subsequent to the termination of the war : 
payment being made contingent on the fact that 
the claimant shall not, meanwhile, have lapsed 
from his loyalty. 

Every such claimant, once recognissf', would 
feel himself to be, by his ownatt the citizen of 
a free state ; one ot us, detached forever from the 
southern league. A government stockholder, he 
would become pecuniarily intf rested in the sup- 
port of the government and tha restoration of 
peace. 

Even it the legislatures of the border etates 
should not initiate such a policy, the loyal men of 
these states will accept it. 

Such a measure does not involve expense in 
conveying the liberated negro to other countries. 
It has hitherto, indeed, been the usuil policy in 
slave states to discourage, as d».ngerou9, the resi- 
dence thereof free blacks; and hence an idea that 
colonization should be the concomitant of eman- 
cipation. Of general emancipitiOD, there is no 
need whatever that it should be. Tnose who 
take up such aa idea forget that the jealousy 
with which slaveholders regard the presence of 
free negroes springs out of the dread that these 
coay infect vsrith a desire for fret dom the slaves 
around them, thus rendering th»m insubordi- 
nate. But when all are free thtra will be no 
slaves to incite, nor any chains to be broken by 
resort to insurrection. '' 

It is no business of ours either to decide, for the 
liberated neg'O, where he shall dwtl', or to fur- 
nish his iraveliing expenses. Freemen, black or 
white, ehoutd select their own dweUing place and 
pay their own way. 

As to the frfars of competiioa in labor sought 
to be excited in the minds ot the northern work- 
ing man, they have foundation only in case eman- 
cipation be refused; for tuch rtlasal would flood 
the North with lu^itives. If, on the contrary, 



emancipation be carried ont, the strong local 
attachments of the negro ■will lEduce him, with 
rarest exceptions, to remain aa a hired laborer 
where he worked as a s \'e. Thus humane 
masters will not lack sufflcient working hands, 
of which colonization would deprive them. 
And if, notwithstanding the probable rise of 
southern staples, profits, at first, should be less, 
the security of the planter will be greater. He 
will no longer lie down at night uncertain whether 
the morning's news may Eot be that his elaves 
have risen against them. 

This is the paper view of the question. Bat all 
edicts, ail proclamations, how wise and righteous 
soever, are but idle announcements now, if we 
lack courage and conduct to enforce them. 

Courage we have. Riw levies have behaved 
like veterans. Tbe skeletons of regiments re- 
duced to one-tenth their original number, attest 
the desperate valor with which they confronted 
death. Not with the rank and file is the blame ! 
The leading! There has been the secret of 
failure. 

Wi'h all the advantages of a just cause over 
cur enemies, we have suffered them to outdo us 
in earnestness. We lack the enthusiasm which 
made irresistible the charge of Cromwell's Iron- 
sides. We need the invincible impulse of a sen 
timent. We want, above all, leaders who know 
and feel what they are fighting for. This is a 
war in which mercenaries avail not. There must 
be a higher motive than the pay of a Swiss — a 
holier duty urging on, than the professional pride 
or the blind obedience of a soldier. By parlia- 
mentary usage a proposed measure is entrusted, 
for fostering care, to its friencJs. So should this 
warbe. Its conduct should be confided to men 
whose hearts and souls are in it. 

Again. It has long been one of our national 
sins that we pass by, with scarcely a rebuke, the 
gravest public offences. We utterly fail in hold- 
ing to a strict accountibiliiy our public men. 
The result of such failure, in peace, had almost 
escaped our notice. In war wa have now beheld 
its effects, flagrant and terrible. 

It was not to be expected that among so many 
thousands of offlotrs suddenly appointed there 
should not be some hundreds of incomietents 
Such things must be. No one is to blame if, in 
field or garden, weeds spring up. The blame 
rests with him who leaves them there to choke 
the crop and cumber the ground. 

Acconntabilitj — that should be the watchword 
— ACCODNTABiLiTY, Stem, Unrelenting ! Office hii 
its emoluments; let it have its refponsibilities 
also. Let us demand, as Napoleon demanded, 
success from our leaders. The rule may work 
harshly. War needs harsh rnlee. Actions are j 



not to be measured In war by the standard of 
peace. The sentinel, worn by extreme fat'gae, 
who elee^ps at his post, incurs the penalty ol 
death, ihere is mercy in courts-martial— drum- 
head courts- martial. A dozen officers shot, when- 
ever the gravity ol the offence demands it, may 
be the saving of life to tens of thousands of brave 
men. 

Eighteen months have passed. Eight hundred 
millions have been spent. We have a million of 
armed men in the field. More than a hundred 
thousand rest in soldiers' graves. And for all this, 
what result ? Is it strange if sometimes the heait 
sinks and resslution fails at the thought that, 
frora sheer administrative infirmity, the vast 
sacrifice may have been all in vain? 

But let the Past go! Its fatal faults, (difficult 
perhaps, to avoid, under an effort so cudden and 
so vast) can never be recalled. Doubtless they 
had their use. It needed the grievous incapacity 
we have witnessed, the stinging reverses we have 
suffered, the invasion even of free states we have 
lived to see commenced ; it needed the hecatombs 
of dead piled up unavaillngly on battle- field after 
battle field— the desolate hearths, the broken- 
hearted survivors— it needed all this to pave the 
way for that emancipation which is the only har- 
binger of peace. 

Toe Future ! that is still ours to improve. Nor, 
if some clouds yet rest upon it, is it without 
brigbt promise. S'gns of nascent activity, energy, 
and a resolution to hold accountable for the 
issue the leaders of our armies, are daily appa- 
rent. Better than all, the initiative in a true line 
of policy has been taken. The twenty-third of 
September has had its effect. The path of safety 
is before us ; steep and ragged, indeed, but no 
longer doubtful nor obscure. A lamp has been 
lit to guide our steps; a lamp that may burn 
more brightly before a new year dawns upon us. 
The noble prayer of Ajax has been vouchsafed in 
our case. At last we have light to fight by. 

We shall reach a quiet haven if we but follow 
faithfully and perscveringly that guiding light. 

There is, at this moment, in the hearts of all 
good men throughout the length and breadth of 
the land, no deeper feeling, no more earnest long- 
ing, than for peace ; peace not for the day, not to 
last for a few years ; but peace, on a foundation of 
rock, for ourselves and for our children alter us. 
May the hearts of our rulers be opened to the con- 
viction that tl.ey can purchase only a shambling 
counterfeit except atone cost ! God give them to 
see, ere it be too late, that THE prich ofendubinq 

P£\CE IS GENERAL EMANCIPATION ! 

I am, sir, your obedient servant, 

Robert Dalb Ovrsm. 
New York, November 10, 1863. 



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